Rick Raw: Vito Fossella– Another Political Hypocrite Exposed

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

Ah yes, the exposed political hypocrites keep popping up like daisies. Former Democratic Governor of NY, Eliot Spitzer’s incredibly rapid fall from grace stunned his family, friends, and constituents. He was exposed through a wire-tap using the services of a high class prostitution ring-not once but many times, paying five grand a session. As a prosecutor, he ran an Eliot Ness-styled law and order regime, busting organized white collar crime bosses and prostitution rings. He then won the Governorship on a get-tough-with-crime platform. His exposure as a blatant hypocrite, adulterer, and sex addict inspired the producers of Law & Order to write an episode ("ripped from the headlines") similar to Spitzer’s case.

Republican Congressman, Vito Fossella may not have his own episode of Law & Order to continually remind the public of his downfall, but his level of hypocrasy is on the same level of shame as Spitzer’s. When Fossella was nabbed for drunken driving he let it slip that he was going to visit his daughter. The cop that stopped him looked at his address and asked him how come he was no where near his home. Then, not thinking about the ramifications, he told the officer that he was visiting his other daughter and family near the location where he was stopped. "Other daughter and family" the cop wrote down on his report.

It turned out when the press got hold of the police report and investigated, Fossella has a second family in Alexandria, his mistress Laura Fay, a retired Air Force officer, and their 3-year old daughter. The "family values" ultra-conservative Fossella had to confess to his wife, Mary Pat that he was leading a secret life for six years with another woman. And, he told Laura that he was separated from Mary Pat. Yeah, that’s the oldest lie in the book that philandering men tell their mistresses.

More seriously, Fossella’s affair began on a tax-payer paid junket across Europe. Although, Fossella apologized, he has refused to resign. Considering Fossella’s entire career in Congress has been devoted to passing legislation like the Marriage Protection Amendment and the posting of the Ten Commandments, and he voted no to funding adoptions for gay couples, his polygamous double life constitutes a huge conflict of interest. And, what about the commandment, "Thy shall not commit adultery?" I guess in his twisted logic, having two families better equipped him to understand the dynamics of family life.

These lying, cheating, mealy-mouthed politicians tell their constituents what they want to hear to get elected. Then they do what they want–such as cheat on their wives, have clandestine affairs with other men, abuse their power for monetary gain, and lie through their teeth as every word comes out of their mouths. And then they have the gall to refuse to resign. I say kick them out of their jobs. They’re not worthy of the public trust.

Look, I’m not saying that I and everyone else has not erred and done things for which we are ashamed, but not everyone is elected to office on the family values platform and promising to vote for conservative principles, then get caught living a lifestyle that contradicts the values on which they were elected. Hypocrisy cuts deep. In Vito Fossella’s case, it undermines his credibility. Therefore, he’s a number ten on my scumbag chart.

Rick Raw: Burgeoning Homelessness in America a National Disgrace–Part of W’s Shameful Legacy

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

As America’s catastrophic economic crisis worsens, many more former middle-class citizens have been forced into homelessness through rapidly declining financial circumstances. Just today I read a story about a 67 year-old woman, Barbara Harvey in Santa Barbara, California who was laid-off from her job and lost her condo. It hit me hard because her misfortune could happen to me.

Three quarters of Barbara’s income went to paying for her residence. Forced out of her home, she couldn’t afford to rent an apartment on her social security income. With no where else to go, Barbara has to live in her small Honda car with her two golden retrievers. She managed to find a part time job at $8.00 an hour, but the income from the job plus her Social Security check are not enough for her to afford any other living arrangements.

Since it is illegal to sleep in your car in California, a non-profit organization called New Beginnings Counseling Center, which is a homelessness outreach program, secured twelve parking lots so women like Barbara could park their cars and spend the night in their cars safely from 7:00 pm to 7:00 am, seven days a week. The fact that New Beginnings needed twelve parking lots to accommodate all the homeless women is a sad commentary on our fractured economy.

Homelessness is growing exponentially in America as the "slowdown"( recession) worsens. I hold George W. Bush responsible for his disastrous economic policies and the nine trillion dollar national debt degrading our financial resources.

Today, the thousands of middle class people who have been downsized or fired in the surge of corporate cutbacks are finding it difficult or impossible to find jobs. Soon, they can’t afford their houses or apartments and are forced onto the streets. Many of these proud people end up living in their cars. They are not bums, drug addicts, or alcoholics–they are you and me.

Like Barbara, I lost my job I’d held for 24 years as a journalist for a weekly publication The national downturn in the economy and the Internet revolution caused the magazine to close its doors. Fortunately, my wife’s and my Social Security incomes plus our pensions from past employers, enable us to just squeeze by every month. I do some freelance work but the pay is pitiful and the jobs are scarce. At least I have a roof over my head. However, we are but a disaster away from the street.

Yes, there is something rotten in America. The real estate crash, a credit crisis, a broken health-care system, and a declining job market have left middle-class Americans out in the cold. Our priorities are skewed. We can spend billions fighting a winless war in Iraq, but we can’t help our middle class recover from forced unemployment and homelessness. It’s an unconscionable scandal that goes against our basic human rights principles.

No one in America should have to live on the streets or in their car. The government–either local or Federal-- could construct low cost pre-fab housing or provide non toxic trailers for the homeless in the acres of unused real estate scattered around every city. The numerous abandoned homes could be used to house the homeless instead of sitting empty and becoming unlivable eye-soars.

Our country gives millions to other countries in foreign aid, when there is great need here in the homeland. We only have to examine the long-term aftermath of the devastating Katrina hurricane in Louisiana and Mississippi to see how our government reacts to major disasters. In Baton Rouge, Louisiana there are still eighty thousand people camped out in toxic FEMA trailers. The government only gives out medicine to alleviate the symptoms of the airborne toxins in the trailers, instead of providing safe trailers.

Wake up and demand change. Fight back with proactive political involvement. It’s our government. They work for us. Change can only happen when large numbers of people get involved with our representatives in Washington. If not, we’ll see more parking lots filled with people living in their cars. It’s part of W’s shameful legacy.

Rick Raw: Myanmar’s Heartless Junta Plays Politics with Victims of Cyclone

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

The aftermath of Myanmar’s devastating cyclone has left over 100,000 people dead and thousands more homeless, starving, and with no potable drinking water. This calamity has been compounded by Myanmar’s totalitarian junta’s use of the tragedy to spread propaganda and demonstrate to the world that it rules with an iron fist. The free world governments should threaten the junta with removal by force if they do not give the various aid organizations carte blanche to help the people.

Over a million people could die of starvation and disease if the aid organizations are not allowed into the country. On May 13, a U.S. military cargo plane, loaded with 14 tons of supplies flew out of the Thai air force base of Utanpao and finally was cleared to land in Myanmar. But the junta immediately took control of the shipment, meaning there was no guarantee that the supplies would make their way to the people who need it.

In contrast, the controlling communist leadership of the Republic of China opened its airports and boundaries to any country that wanted to help the victims of China’s catastrophic countrywide 7.9 earthquake May 12th , that killed over 20,000 people and rising rapidly–a much bigger disaster than the cyclone in Myanmar. Indeed, the Chinese didn’t need any bad PR before the Olympics, which is already causing protests around the world.

At the UN, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon criticized Myanmar’s junta’s slow response to helping the cyclone victims. Three of the UN Security Councils’ five veto-empowered members–France, Britain, and the United States–are considering a possible resolution that would require Myanmar’s junta to open its doors to more aid. Of course, to the despotic junta, a resolution means nothing.

The truth is: The junta will only respond to a show of force. That is: If US Marines show up with heavy ordnance and surround their headquarters’ building, demanding action or else the junta will be wiped off the face of the map, they will have to comply. Then a temporary multinational government could be installed until the people could get back on their feet to hold a national election. Why are we messing with this tin-horn junta that rules a dirt-poor ox-cart society? Sometimes you have to have the courage to use force with these idiots.

Just today, May 14th, the Myanmar junta barred foreign aid workers from reaching cyclone survivors in the hard-hit regions. More seriously, the junta has been handing out rotten food and poor quality biscuits. The high protein biscuits that were sent into the country by the United States were diverted to the junta’s warehouses for themselves.

Meanwhile, most supplies are piling up at Yangon’s airport. The junta has no equipment to lift cargo off the supply aircraft. Moreover, the country has no large trucks to haul the cargo to outlying regions. To make matters worse, the monsoon season has begun, with rain soaking supplies left out in the open. The United Nations estimates that the death toll is rising rapidly from the initial 100,000 dead as people starve to death or die of disease.

Given the junta’s total lack of compassion and cooperation with unilateral humanitarian efforts to save Myanmar’s population, now is the time to send in the Marines or an international coalition to force the junta into action. The free nations of the world can not stand by and let millions of Myanmar citizens die because of a heartless regime’s efforts to manipulate the disaster for propaganda purposes. The aid organizations are considering helicopter drops into the worst hit areas, whether the junta likes it or not. It’s a step in the right direction

Rick Raw: Josef Fritzl Case–The Personification of Evil

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

I rarely comment on crime stories, however the horrifying case of Josef Fritzl has outraged me to the point that I feel compelled to write about it. Just when I think I’ve heard the worst case of sexual abuse, the Austrian degenerate Fritzl, 73, takes this crime to a new level. This guy makes Hitler seem like a monk.

This sensational international media story broke when the police arrested Josef Fritzl on a long list of serious charges. Soon the shocked Austrian police heard Fritzl confess that his kept his daughter, Elisabeth, now 42, prisoner in his basement dungeon for 24 years. He began raping her at age 11. By the time she was 18, he had fathered 7 children with her, three of whom (now 19,18, and 5) spent their entire life locked in his underground prison with their mother, never seeing the light of day.

For reasons that authorities do not understand, Fritzl allowed three other children (now 15, 18, and 12) to live upstairs with his wife. Right, one big twisted family. Fritzl and Elisabeth had an infant who died shortly after birth. Fritzl threw the body into the furnace. The demon Feritzl was exposed when his eldest daughter (of his daughter) became seriously ill and he allowed Elisabeth to accompany her to the hospital. There she told the doctors the incredible story. The cops were called and Fritz was arrested.

How did this unprecedented incest case go on for so many years without someone calling for help? There are very few answers. Fritzl was a tyrant and dominated his household with an iron will. He even rented rooms in his house, but always told tenants that they were forbidden from going into the basement. His wife was scared to death of him. He worked as an electrrician and was respected by his colleagues and boss, who said he as a hard worker and a jovial man.

Unbelievably, Social Services visited Fritzl often because he and his wife were foster parents for two more kids. To explain why Elisabeth was missing, Fritzl told the authorities and his wife that she had run off and joined a cult. Meanwhile, Fritzl was down in his hell hole abusing his daughter and children, locked away from the world with no education or amenities.

On a broader sociological scale, this is the same country that, just two years ago, was reeling from another girl-in-a-basement horror. Natasha Kampusch was kidnaped by a stranger at age 10 and was held captive in a basement for eight years. In that case, no one suspected that this girl had been held hostage. When she finally broke away from her captor, he walked in front of a train and killed himself. It turned out that the government "covered up evidence" that the kidnapper had been identified as a top suspect in Kampusch’s disappearance early in the case, but he was never questioned.

What can the Austrian authorities do with Fritzl that will bring peace and justice to the victims of this heinous crime, so disgusting, I can hardly believe it’s not fiction? In fact, no fiction writer could possibly conjure up something this degrading and horrific. More seriously, Fritzl flaunted his lust for young girls by frequently traveling to Thailand to participate in sex acts with underage girls, some as young as 10. To further exacerbate public outrage, there are photos of Fritzl in a Speedo getting a massage on the beach in Thailand.

Indeed, Fritzl has done unspeakable damage to the entire family, who will never be able to have a normal life. Elisabeth is so disturbed, she is being treated in an undisclosed mental hospital. The Austrian government has agreed to help the family financially and psychologically.
Fundamentally, there is something wrong in Austrian society. The entire country is taught to bury its Nazi past and see no evil–yesterday or today. To be fair, though, the Austrian people can not be held accountable for Fritzl’s actions. Perhaps the culture’s laissez-faire attitude factored into Fritzl’s long evil career of rape and incest. Fritzl’s mug shot is dark and foreboding. It’s a seething portrait of a man possessed by demons and a selfish disregard for anyone but himself. If evil has a face, it’s Josef Fritzl!

Rick Raw: Obama Clinton Campaign Overkill–Mixed Martial Arts Match to Settle Race

By Rick Grant rickgrant01@comcast.net www.rickatnight.com

As Obama and Clinton battle it out in this tedious, never ending political slugfest, voters are turned off by the mud-slinging and the dragged out battle for the Democratic nomination. Frankly, I’m sick of the campaign and hearing the pundits’ endless speculation about every word out of Clinton or Obama’s mouth.

The campaign has turned into a traveling carnival of sound-bytes, accusations, and counter-accusations by Obama and Clinton. It’s a freak show. "See the pant-suited lady tell stories of her close calls on the campaign trail. See the dark man ramble about his roots and white mother. See the almost white crazy pastor rail against white people." Yes, it’s become a bad comedy show that is alienating young and old. Come on, enough already! By November, people may just decide not to vote because they are so disgusted with the whole undignified process. People would rather get a root-canal than watch this sleaze-ball spectacle. .

Clearly, Clinton’s Pennsylvania win has given her a boost in the polls. But she still trails Obama in delegates, and a recent Newsweek poll shows that Obama has a 7 point lead over Clinton. But with margins of error taken into account, going into Indiana and North Carolina, Clinton an Obama are in a dead heat. If this plays out, Obama will still emerge ahead in delegates. If Clinton loses just one of these critical states, she may be out. But what about Florida and Michigan. Are those votes going to be thrown out? Again, are Floridians going to get screwed like in 2000? Probably!

To settle this, I suggest a mixed martial arts contest between Clinton and Obama with the nomination going to the winner. Imagine: In one corner, Senator Clinton wearing an all-silk karate outfit ready to rumble. Earlier, Clinton was seen knocking-back a shot and a beer, getting into her working person’s mode to do battle with Obama. In the other corner, Obama looking confident in his skin tight black jump suit. The women scream when he enters the ring. Reverend Sharpton is the referee. It’s a 3 round no-holds-barred smack down. The match sold out in the first few minutes that the tickets went on sale.

The bell rings--Clinton jumps out and goes for Obama’s neck. He counters with the throw-down. Clinton rallies, jumps to her feet and in a flurry of punches staggers Obama. He recovers and counterpunches with vicious resolve. Clinton falls back but keeps her footing. The two fighters trade punches and suddenly it’s the third round. Instantly, Obama goes out and throws Clinton to the mat with such force, Clinton is dazed. He gets a death grip on her neck, but Clinton grabs his leg and pulls it back. The two fighters scream with pain. Reverend Sharpton stops the match, and declares a draw. The crowd boos and screams for a winner. Bloodied and exhausted, the two candidates slowly get to their feet and hug each other. They vow to come together as the dream ticket. The next match will decide who runs for President and who settles for vice President.

Yes, this is the ultimate badass politics I can get behind.